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02/25/2017 11:00 PMThe 6th-seeded Valley Regional girls’ basketball squad played at No. 2 seed Cromwell in the Shoreline Conference Tournament semifinals at Coginchaug School on Feb. 22 and lost by the final score of 56-36. With the Shoreline Conference Tournament behind them, the Warriors will next compete in the Class M State Tournament as the 23rd seed and are playing at No. 10 Prince Tech in Hartford in a first round matchup on Tuesday, Feb. 28 at 7:45 p.m. If the Warriors win that game, they will either play at No. 7 seed St. Paul or host and 26th-seeded Griswold in second round action at 7 p.m. on Friday, March 3.
During the regular season, Valley did not fare well against Cromwell, which ultimately went on to win the Shoreline Conference Tournament against No. 1 seed East Hampton by a score of 48-36. The Warriors had lost to Cromwell by 46 points and 31 points on Jan. 3 and Feb. 12, respectively. Still, Valley Head Coach Geoff Konstan hoped to build upon the improvements the Warriors made in their second games against the Panthers when the two teams tipped off again in the Shoreline semis.
“The score shows an obvious improvement in that we only lost by 20 points this time, but the game honestly was closer than the 20-point margin suggests,” said Coach Konstan, whose club enters states with an overall record of 13-9. “We really played well in the first half, breaking Cromwell’s full court press, moving the ball, and running our offenses very well, but our shots just wouldn’t drop.”
Following a tough first half in which the Warriors couldn’t get their offense going, they trailed Cromwell 27-9 at intermission. However, the third quarter was much closer as Cromwell won it by a 19-18 margin to increase its lead to 19. In the fourth, the Warriors nearly played the Panthers even again and were only outscored 10-9, but the deficit proved too much to overcome, and Cromwell moved on to the final.
Coach Konstan said the difference in the game was the first half and felt the outcome could have been different had things gone more smoothly for his squad during the first 16 minutes.
“I really felt that we hung tough with them,” said Konstan. “If some of the good looks we had at the basket just had gone in, the game would have been much closer at halftime.”
For Valley, sophomore guard Alexis Finnerty led the scoring attack with 16 points, including 10 in the third quarter. In addition, senior captains Francesca Daniels and Libby Spitzschuh added seven and five points respectively. On the defensive end, senior captain Brianna O’Brien had a standout night while guarding Cromwell’s All-Shoreline First Team guard Jenna Serrantino. O’Brien held Serrantino, who leads the Panthers in scoring, to a season-low five points.
In the end, Coach Konstan knew the Warriors had a tall task ahead of them going into the Cromwell contest, and was pleased to see that they went head on at the Panthers.
“I’m extremely proud of the girls for the effort, intensity, and passion they showed [versus Cromwell],” said Coach Konstan. “They stuck with the game-plan and never got rattled. I’m positive that if we play like that in the State Tournament, we’ll be competitive against anyone that we face.”